Thursday, March 11, 2004

The Soros New World Order: A Review of George Soros' "The Bubble of American Supremacy"

It is rare to come across an author who footnotes an earlier embarrassing prediction.

George Soros in his new book, The Bubble of American Supremacy, provides such a footnote when he reminds readers that earlier on he had predicted the collapse of the global capitalist system. Certainly not a minor prediction by any measure. "I ... made an unconditional prediction ..., in 1997, when I predicted the imminent collapse of the global capitalist system. Later I had to eat my words," Soros writes.

It is also rare to come across an author who has $5 billion, let alone an author who has spent $5 billion to save the world. Soros, by his own accounting, tells us he has spent such sums. Since $5 billion has not been enough to save the world, Soros has again put pen to paper and written a new book.

George Soros' book is an attack on the Bush Administration's military adventure into Iraq. Lest some mistake the Soros attack as an attack on nation building by the Bush Administration, Soros clearly sets things straight. "My particular concern is that the debacle in Iraq will prevent future efforts and nation building," Soros tells us.

Soros, in other words, is an international meddler. While he does spend some of his own vast fortune on his schemes and while he does not like the way George W. Bush meddles, he most certainly is a meddler himself and has no qualms about taxing the citizenry to add to his billions in an effort to save the world.

"Total international assistance amounted to $5.6 billion in 2002. This amount represents only 0.18% of global GDP...countries at the center of global capitalist system enjoy far too many advantages over countries at the periphery," Soros tells us.

It's easy to see where Soros is going with these comments. "..in 1992, I proposed that a $10 billion IMF program to Russia should be earmarked for the payment of social security and unemployment benefits,"Soros writes.

This is a curious comment given the state of social security in the United States and the fact that it is so close to the precipice of collapse that even Alan Greenspan warns that changes must be made. It becomes even more curious when one evaluates another comment written by Soros, "The dismantling of the welfare state is a relatively new phenomenon whose full effects have not yet been felt."

Soros cites the United States as a country that has dismantled its welfare state. One, of course, would get objections from many that the United States has in anyway dismantled its welfare progams, a country that has an ever expanding social security base, medicare base and unemployment insurance program. But, this is what Soros writes.

In other words, Soros is a very confused thinker. The book is chock full of such confusion. Clearly, Soros' vision of the world hasn't got much clearer since his embarrassing forecast of imminent collapse of the global capitalist system. Further, don't mistake Soros for an isolationist. For Soros military action and nation building is not out of the question, military action is, indeed, a last resort for Soros. George Soros is not against a New World Order. He simply wants it to be the Soros New World Order as opposed to the Bush New World Order.